The XML version of the IOC keyword list allows us to use a brief program to produce a keyword list containing extensive taxonomic information. Two versions are available: one structured by family, the other by order. Choose the one that suits your workflow best. The lists are free, as is the program, downloadable at http://thejaffes.org/content/structured-keywords-lightroom. You may want the program if you want to customize the data in the keyword file or wish to generate a keyword list in with another version of the IOC list.

By using this list to tag photos, not only will the photo have the name of the bird, but also its scientific name, family, and order—the list by family only automatically marks the order of the family. Also included in each list are other taxonomic categories, also automatically applied, such as kingdom, phylum, class, clades, subclass, etc.

Bird Jar (Jason Kuntz, May 19, 2014)

Bird Jar is a bird checklist app for Android that helps you keep track of your bird sightings.

Over 10,500 bird species are included in the listing (all known bird species, per the IOC World Bird List v4.2).

This is not intended to be a bird identification app, however images are provided from the Bird Jar webserver for over 900 birds (with more to be added in the future). Many images of North American and European birds are included.

Filter birds from the following regions: North America (north of Mexico), Mexico, Central America, the Caribbean, South America, Europe, Africa, Asia, Australia/Oceania/Pacific Ocean, Southern Atlantic Ocean, and the Indian Ocean.

You may filter on one or more regions, or show all world birds.

Browse all birds by bird family.

Quickly view bird family counts, as well as your life list counts per bird family.

View all your recent sightings.

Search for birds, bird families, and sighting locations.

Record bird sightings by date and location, including bird count.

Record unidentified bird sightings.

Take or import photos, and make bird call recordings. These can then be viewed either on the bird details page, or all at once on the Photos and Recordings page.

Enter notes.

View all sightings by date and/or location.

Save custom sighting locations.

Save birds to custom categories.

View your Life List checklist.

Most views have customizable sort and filter options.

View sighting maps.

Email a bird sighting report.

Export bird sightings to the eBird record format (which can then be imported into the eBird web application).

The national list of the birds of Turkey will be published very soon at the Noah’s Ark National Biodiversity Database (www.nuhungemisi.gov.tr), Republic of Turkey Ministry of Forestry and Water Issues. This list was compiled by Kiraz Erciyes Yavuz (19 Mayıs University) and Esra Per (Gazi Univesity). We follow the “IOC World Bird List” (Eds. Gill & Donsker, 2014), which is regularly updated in the light of recent scientific developments.

iGoTerra (Björn Anderson 4/21/2014)

iGoTerra.com is a website for everyone interested in wildlife featuring all wildlife group (birds, mammals, plants, fishes, amphibians, insects, etc.). For birds, members are offered to use IOC taxonomy and names including subspecies. Species information including all bird names in multiple languages are also available on smartphones through a web-app. iGoTerra database is now updated on the very same day of the IOC official release, enabling iGoTerra members instant and automatic updates of their list of observations.

iGoTerra members can record, manage and share all their wildlife observations, import their data from other sources, geo-code observations and photos, prepare their trips with unique tools from planning to trip report. iGoTerra offers unlimited possibilities to create and engage into communities and projects from friendly competition (ranking at family, genus and species levels) to forum, collective trip preparation and more.

Lifebirds Journal (Jim George 3/8/2014)

Lifebirds Journal, an app for recording bird sightings, is now updated to version 4.1 of the IOC World Bird List. It is available for the the iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad from the iTunes Stores and is completely updated for iOS 7. Lifebirds Journal provides birders with a tool for recording, listing and sharing bird sightings. Features include:

a database with all the species and families in the IOC World Bird List

species lists for 10 world regions

powerful search technology to quickly find a species

search terms include alpha codes and alternate English names

option to view North American field guide names when different from IOC names

quick and easy entry of sighting information with minimal typing

minimum detail required but maximum detail possible

location reuse once details are entered

detailed bird counts by age and sex

notes and/or voice memos (recordings)

GPS coordinates of a sighting

details of a sighting can be emailed in one step

sightings lists by any combination of dates/location/family

lists ranging from one day to a life list

multiple options for emailing lists in spreadsheet format

eBird compatible export format available

multiple ways to sort and display sightings and species lists

custom checklists

local storage of all data on device

no need for an Internet connection except to send email

Xeno-canto (Sander Pieterse 1/30/2014)

Over the years, Xeno-canto expanded from a South America-focused site to complete global coverage An artefact of this expansion was the stepwise adoption of different checklists for different continents, an issue we finally fixed when we switched to the IOC list in September 2011. The IOC list has served XC well so far. It offers an open, comprehensive and actively updated global checklist. Plus, we have access to the subspecies; something very worthwile, as we try to cover all geographical diversity. Yesterday (January 29, 2014) we switched our database to the latest IOC version 4.1.

Checklist of the birds of the Western Palearctic (EBN Italia) (Gianluigi Castelli January 7, 2014)

After months of research and discussions, we are happy to announce the EBN Italia Checklist of the birds of the Western Palearctic (WP). The list exists of species reliably recorded in the WP (sensu Cramp et al 1977-1994) and, more importantly, also lists all subspecies recorded within the WP with their status. The text is in Italian, but an edition in English is in preparation. We follow the taxonomic classification of the International Ornithological Committee (IOC) (www.worldbirdnames.org) and the decisions of all national rarities committees; only species that occur as genuine vagrants (and are thus accepted into category A and B of the national lists) are listed, but category C species have been listed separately.The list can be downloaded at: http://ebnitalia.it/easyNews/NewsLeggi.asp?NewsID=29We welcome suggestions, corrections and if you have questions, please don’t hesitate to ask us.

UAE adopting IOC (Tommy Pedersen 1/9/2014)

The EBRC (Emirates Bird Records Committee) have adopted the taxonomy of the IOC World Bird List for the United Arab Emirates as of January 1st 2014. This makes UAE the third country in the Middle East to follow IOC, after Oman and Kuwait.

“This ‘desktop’ application makes it easy for you to maintain just one list – your life list – by combining the IOC and Clements’ taxonomic lists into an easy-to-use application that shows the two taxonomies side-by-side – at subspecies level. As there is only one list to maintain it will be especially useful to the inveterate non-lister, while for anyone keen on avian taxonomy, it helps you see where the two taxonomies agree and, more importantly, disagree. It is regularly updated as new taxonomies are published. [Runs on Windows from XP through to 8.1]”

WBCP Philippine Checklist (Rob Hutchinson, Arne Jensen 10/29/2013)

Our new “Checklist of the Birds of the Philippines 2013″ is ready for your bird records starting 1st January 2014. We have now 673 species including 234 endemics in the Philippines. The new list is based on the IOC World Bird List version 3.5. The WBCP Checklist will be updated every year to incorporate the IOC changes and possible new country records during each year.

http://ebonph.wordpress.com/2012/05/31/the-wbcp-records-committee/

You will notice many changes compared to our current 2009 Checklist and to the Kennedy field guide. The changes include:

– splits of former species into two or more new species;

- new documented country records from the field;

- updated English and scientific names (note that in six cases we have retained

the previous WBCP English name instead of the IOC name);

- different taxonomic sequence and family groupings;

- updated information on range and conservation status.

iGoTerra (Björn Anderson 9/5/2013)

iGoTerra.com is a website for everyone interested in any taxa-group, e.g. birds, mammals, plants, fish, amphibians, insects, etc. For birds we provide the option to completely following IOC bird names including subspecies levels. Each release from IOC is directly updated.

The website offers services like keeping all your wildlife (e.g. birds) records, importing your data from other sources, photo galleries , preparing trips including a unique trip reporting tool, iGoTerra member ranking (family, genus and species levels), the possibility to create activities/projects around certain topics and much more. Additionally iGoTerra offers a web-app with bird names in multiple languages as well as basic species data like photo and range maps.

iGoTerra is a Swedish registered limited company and provides secure and future-proof internet services. The iGoTerra management team currently consists of Bengt-Eric Sjölinder, Nicklas Strömberg and Björn Anderson. In addition there is an extensive global network of checklist administrators for the various taxa-groups.

BARC Checklist v2013July is released (David James 7/16/2013)

A new version of the BARC Australian Checklist v2013July is
now available on the BARC website as a downloadable Microsoft Excel spreadsheet
(BARC_Australian_Checklist_v2013July.xls). The BARC Website is at:http://www.tonypalliser.com/barc/barc-home.html

Like previous versions, this checklist is intended to follow
the IOC World Bird Names checklist to the letter, in terms of species taxonomy,
scientific and English names, spelling and sequence. As with previous versions,
subspecies are not included. There are no intended deviations from the IOC list
(other than abbreviating it to species and Australia) and there are no novel
taxonomic opinions expressed by BARC in that regard.

This upgrade includes changes to the IOC up to 1 July 2013 (Gill,
F & D Donsker 2013; IOC World Bird List v 3.4; http://www.worldbirdnames.org/). It also includes some corrections to spelling and species sequence from the previous BARC Checklist (v2.0).
.Why BARC Follows the IOCWith the recent release of Birdlife Australia?s Australian
Checklist, it is worth recording why BARC uses the IOC sequence.
As noted by Tony Palliser recently, BARC has been following
the IOC checklist to some extent since 2006. Prior to that BARC had followed
Christidis & Boles (1994) for species already recorded in Australia and
Sibley & Monroe (1993) for species that might be new to Australia. By 2006
both these lists were out of date and Dr Walter Boles (from the former
Taxonomic Advisory Committee of Birds Australia) recommended that BARC follow
the then new IOC list instead. Soon after that Christidis & Boles (2008)
was published, so BARC followed that for species already recorded in Australia
and the IOC for potential new species. However, Christidis & Boles (2008)
became dated much faster than its predecessor, not least of all due to
increased birding close to Asia and frequent reports of Asian species not treated
in Australian texts.

By 2011 C&B (2008) was well out of date and it was
inconvenient for BARC to follow two checklists that sometimes clashed.
Therefore BARC decided to prepare an Australian list based on a world-wide list.
We did not automatically choose the IOC list as the base list, but considered a
number of criteria. We wanted a base list that covered the whole world, was
widely used, was dynamic and frequently updated, was publicly available for
free (non-commercial), had transparent decision making processes, and provided
potential for some input from Australia. The Clements and Howard & Moore
(etc) checklists are produced for commercial purposes and therefore potentially
unsuitable for BARC to copy. The Birdlife International checklist is, like the
IOC checklist, downloadable from the internet, and it ran a close second.
However, the taxonomic decisions in that checklist are made by staff at
Birdlife International in the UK and there seems to be no process for outside
input. It is an aim of BARC that there should be some Australian input into our
country?s checklist and we hope to contribute to the IOC checklist process in
some manner in the future.

The IOC World Bird List site contains more information about
the open processes, dynamic revisions and cooperative approach of the IOC
checklist system. http://www.worldbirdnames.org/The BARC Australian Checklist v1 was first released in
November 2011 and this current version is the 3rdupdate.
Good birding to you all,
David James

Observado.org is a global biodiversity recording project, allowing people from all over the world to collect valuable nature observations, photos and sound recordings at one online database. The result is a database with highly valuable nature data. Our sites are following IOC taxonomy regarding bird species. We already gathered 20.000.000 bird observations by the website forms or by mobile apps. Species group experts and local experts are keen on validating the observations, thereby ensuring the quality of the data and an enormous digital information source on biodiversity!

Scythebill is free, open-source, and cross-platform bird listing software. Users can instantly flip back and forth between the Clements and IOC lists at any point. It has a simple UI, but lots of features – fast data entry (“choose your own banding code”), rapid reports, EBird export (even if you use the IOC list), arbitrary location hierarchies, “sp.” and hybrid entry, and more.

I have just revised our New Guinea Checklist v3.1.4 aligned with the IOC World List as previously. Two free downloads of checklists for Australia and New Guinea are available at www sicklebillsafaris.com, along with the entire back archive of the Papuan New Guinea Birdwatching Society journal Muruk. Sicklebill Safaris uses the IOC format checklist in 99% of cases.

Lifebirds Journal (Jim George 7/13/2012)

Lifebirds Journal is an app by Eucled Design available from the iTunes Store for recording bird sightings on the iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPad. It currently uses version 3.1 of the IOC World Bird List for its species taxonomy. Lifebirds Journal provides birders with a tool for recording, sharing, and interacting with sighting data while in the field. The app was designed to minimize the text input required to enter a wide array of detailed sighting information, including location info (locale, city, state, country, region and GPS coordinates), subspecies, date/time, detailed bird counts by age and sex, additional sighting notes, and voice memos.

Lists of species seen can be generated by any combination of start and end date, sighting location, and species family, allowing users to generate lists as specific or general as desired. Lists can be viewed and organized within the application, or exported via email in spreadsheet format and saved on a home computer. The app also allows users to build and save custom checklists.

Lifebirds Journal provides users with flexible search functionality for easily locating specific birds. Searches can be restricted to one of ten world regions; can be performed using any part of the English or scientific name; can find the IOC name even when an alternative English names is entered; and, in the AOU region, can use 4-letter alpha codes. For the U.S. and Canada, an option is given to display the English name used in North American field guides when it differs from the IOC name.

Check List of Birds in South Africa (Chris Lotz 6/24/2012)

“The official South African bird list (available as a printed booklet and in pdf and excel format) is updated annually after thorough input during the course of each year from a large bird list committee. The list was started 3 years ago and the updated version appears in March every year (the 3rd revision appeared in March 2012).

The basic rules the committee uses to update the list each year are:
1. We follow the IOC (worldbirdnames.org) to a large extent as we see this list as the most authoritative world list available. Specifically:

2. We follow the IOC (worldbirdnames.org) as far as taxonomy (e.g. scientific names, taxonomic order, splits and lumps), is concerned.

3. Our committee votes on any changes to Common Names the IOC proposes. In some instances, the voting process means we accept the IOC change. In other cases it means we retain our existing name. In the latter case, we recommend to the IOC why we think the original name was better, and our hope is that the IOC would revert to the original name, in these instances, especially if they can agree to our reasoning. Generally, the Common Names on the official South African list show few discrepancies when compared to the IOC list.

My name is Graham Watson and I wish to thank you all for supplying the IOC Names Files for amateur photographers who have more than a passing interest in twitching. I wish to inform you that I have used your Names Files to create Adobe Lightroom and Adobe Bridge keyword files to be used by bird photographers to correctly and consistently metadata/tag/keyword their photos. I provide these free of charge to anyone on the internet and believe, given a link on your website, they could be used in a more direct and positive manner for others interested in the world of bird photography. The link to my website is http://grahamwatson.net/ and will find the files in question under the Tools button. Please take a look as I truly believe these will be of great help to users of your website. Mark Wilson from http://www.rusticolus.co.uk (LR Nature Data plugin on your web site) has keywords lists on his site as well and we are in touch with each other regarding the keywords lists. Please feel free to pass on any comments or criticisms you may have.

The ORL (c1060 taxa) and a map of the OSME Region are available on www.osme.org. We adhere closely to IOC updates. The ORL Listmaster (MB) is at orl@osme.org. The first draft of the ORL utilised the final 2005 draft of the IOC list of English names. It was formally adopted by the Council of the Ornithological Society of the Middle East, the Caucasus and Central Asia (OSME) shortly afterwards. The ORL also adopted the taxonomy of Howard and Moore, 3rd edition from the outset. OSME Council encourages countries within the OSME Region to adopt ORL nomenclature and taxonomy, but we will cross-refer when any country adopts a different approach. The ORL approach has helped produce country checklists and national and regional field guides, some in the national language of the country concerned.

Birds of Slovakia (Peter Kovalik 12/2010)

A checklist of birds of Slovakia was published in the SOS/BirdLife Slovakia’s journal Tichodroma in December 2010. The checklist is based on the decisions of the Rarities Committee of the SOS/BirdLife Slovakia and on the relevant published sources. It conveys also current knowledge on bird systematics and taxonomy. This list strictly followed IOC World Bird List for scientific names and taxonomic sequence.

Bubo Listing (Andy Musgrove, Mike Prince 7/30/2010)

We have just launched the IOC World List on BUBO Listing. This has been requested by many BUBO Listers and we feel it is likely to be adopted by most as their preferred world listing authority. We have also included species distribution details for all species to make it easier to understand the taxonomic differences between this and the Clements World List.

WorldWaders, a new global initiative for shorebird conservation, is exclusively using the IOC nomenclature for their projects. Naming and order is as IOC suggests and changes in taxonomy is updated at the time of announcement of new version available on the IOC website.

A new Checklist of Birds of China is available online on 1 March 2010. Editing by the editors of China Bird Report book series, this list contains 1408 species that has occured in China. All species are given Scientific, English and Chinese names. It is the first checklist which adopts the framework of the IOC World Checklist and absorbs several recent splits, new records and taxonomic changes, which reflects the recent phylogenetic and taxonomic works on Chinese birds. Appendix with species lists that distributes in Southern Tibet, Tianshan and Nansha Archipelagos are also available. This checklist will also play as the framework for the future publication of China Bird Report series. Comments and remarks are welcome.

I have developed and am continuing to maintain a database containing documented, taxonomically harmonized biological inventories of the world’s protected areas.Until this month, and going back to 1997, I’d been using a derivative of Charles Sibley’s Birds of the World, version 2.6, with updates from the AOU and Alan Peterson’s Zoonomen site (Charles Sibley and Burt Monroe were strong supporters of my work).I have for the past several weeks been transitioning from our former bird nomenclator to IOC 2.3 and have today completed this task. Thus, with the next web update, scheduled for later this month, we will be using names for the bird inventories that adhere to IOC v. 2.3 and will be citing your website as the naming source.These databases currently report about 75% of the world’s bird species, and are we are continuing, as time permits, to expand and add data. If you or anyone associated with your effort has data that they would like to contribute, we’d be delighted to add these, with full professional credit given in citations that appear above the inventories. Many thanks for making this naming standard freely available and thus providing a taxonomic resource that is current, authoritative, and well-documented. I will be turning to your website often in the future.

” LaBORINg is a open project to all ringers/banders from western Palearctic. The Taxonomy and Nomenclature we have adopted is based on the International Ornithological Congress (IOC) list.” http://www.wpbirds.net/

” The wikiproject birds at the English Wikipedia has adopted the IOC list now as the defacto standard. We are currently implementing the names, and soon we should have most names in line with the IOC with one exception so far: African Grey Parrot instead of Grey Parrot, because of the sheer wide use of that name. Maybe something for you guys to consider?”

“Wildlife Computing is happy to announce that the “IOC World List” can now be used with our Wildlife Recorder software package. The IOC World List can be used in addition to the taxonomies previously provided with Wildlife Recorder. The user can instantly change between taxonomies, including the IOC list, to determine their life list.”

“The list below has been compiled essentially from information presented by Gill, F., Wright, M. & Donsker, D. as available at WORLDBIRDNAMES.ORG (see references 1 & 2 below). Birdwatchers in India generally use Grimmett & Inskipp’s ‘Birds of the Indian Subcontinent’ (Ref 3 below) and are familiar with the Common Names and sequence used in that book. This book primarily follows the taxonomy and nomenclature laid out in Inskipp, Tim; Lindsey, Nigel & Duckworth, William’s ‘An Annotated Checklist of the Birds of the Oriental Region’.”

The main page indicates that the de facto standard for bird names is Handbook of Birds of the World (HBW). I am sure it was the most up to date reference at the time of publication, but in the end, it is static snapshot of birdnames from before the time of publication. Unfortunately, the world is dynamic, and that has been recognized by the International Ornithological Congress (IOC), who for that reason maintains a up to date list of both scientific and common names. This list is updated regularly based on the newest insights, and therefore much more up to date than HBW. I therefore propose that this WikiProject changes its de facto standard to the IOC World Bird List for both common and latin names. — Kim van der Linde at venus 12:52, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Naturedata LR

The IOC list of world bird species is now available through Avibase, thanks to Denis LePage and Bird Studies Canada. The powerful Avibase database allows users to create checklists for different localities using alternative world lists.

I am currently developing a very exciting new personal bird recording software, called Bird Journal. Please see www.birdjournal.net , for an insight into the software. If you have the time to help us with the questionnaire, that would be great too. I would like to use the IOC World Bird Names data within this software. From what I have read on your website, copyright has been waived to accelerate adoption. But I would like to confirm that it would be ok for us to use the data. We would be re-distributing the data, stored in our own database format, to be read only by our software. Obviously we would make the source of the data clear, and we would issue updates, as the data changes.

You are probably aware of the website project, the Global Raptor Information Network (”GRIN”) (www.globalraptors.org), that I maintain. I wanted to let you know that I am following your list in most details, and I commend you and your co-author for your efforts to achieve standardization in English vernacular names. I have felt that this was a hopeless quest, but I concede that you have made it seem less hopeless. I have tried hard to include information on the most recent molecular phylogenetic studies on raptors in the taxonomic sections of the GRIN species accounts, and I wanted to call this to your attention on the chance that I have cited some papers there that might not have come to your attention. In addition, the searchable bibliography on GRIN contains over 38,000 records on diurnal raptors by now, and that, too, might be of some use to you

EDITORIAL POLICY

British Ornithologists’ Union (from Chris Perrins)

The BOU decided to effectively go with G&W [in Ibis] except for the ‘after-hyphen’ Caps. There seems to have been a lack of understanding of this – partly of course stemming from not reading the rules! But I do think we under-estimated the complexity of this esp. for the non-English speaker.The reasons for this decision are as follows:

BOU needs to update its English names, especially for Ibis (Records Committee may well continue to use UK vernacular as well).

Choices are fairly limited basically only two current lists – HBW being widely used and G&W – only recently appeared so less well ‘tried’ but backed by IOC.

G&W can be up-dated at will by submissions to IOC.

Many people were comfortable with HBW, but it has two main drawbacks –

It is not dynamic in the sense that there are no plans for developing it with time. Discussions are taking place about HBW’s future after the series is completed, but nothing yet emerged.

There is no list available. Because in the past HBW has found that advance planning of the lists of distant volumes always resulted in them having to be done again (because of changes etc) they now only plan the lists for each volume as its preparation comes up. So, there will be no final list for another 4 years or so.

G&W list exists.

In practice the two are related because Vol 1 of HBW says (p25) ‘Vernacular English names have been based on those selected, on the basis of extensive international correspondence, by B.L.Monroe, and published in Sibley & Monroe 1990; these have already been chosen to act as a basis for the standardization of English nomenclature planned for the 1994 International Congress, and in future volumes the intention is to follow the official list adopted by the congress.’

Wilson Journal of Ornithology

The Editor of WJO, Clait Braun, adopted as policy for that journal the IOC recommended names for bird species outside of North and Middle America, the province of the AOU Checklist Committee (NACC).

Handbook of the Birds of the World (from Josep del Hoyo and Andy Elliott, editors)

We will probably follow the ‘content’ of the names in 99-100% of the cases, but will maintain our own format.We are now completing Volume 12 of the 16 HBW volume series and it does not seem to us logical or helpful to change the structural components that have been used throughout the series to date. If this IOC list of English names had been available at the beginning of the series, we would have had a much stronger tendency towards following it throughout the series.Our intention for the remainder of the HBW series is, in principle, to aim to stick to what we might call the ‘substance’ of their names, except for odd species for which we have strong feelings that their selected name is not the most appropriate – but at this stage we should stress that perhaps this will never occur! They themselves left the door open to future modifications, so we won’t feel that there is anything greatly wrong in the odd disagreement, should this occur.As regards compound names, our intention is pretty much the same: if they use two words, one word or hyphenation, we shall aim to follow them unless we disagree strongly. At this stage we are not yet sure how much we may differ on this score.In hyphenated names we always follow the hyphen with a small letter, rather than the American system that they have (perhaps not surprisingly) adopted. This was, of course, a decision taken right at the start of the series, and to be honest if we had to decide ourselves right now we still prefer it. It seems to us that the system of using a post-hyphenation capital initial letter when the second name refers to the family in which the species belongs is rather a complicated system for vernacular names, which should we believe aim to be as simple as possible for the non-specialist to be able to follow and use easily and correctly. Thus, we shall have “Chestnut-fronted Shrike-babbler” rather than “Chestnut-fronted Shrike-Babbler”. Also in this case there seems to be considerable doubt as to whether or not Pteruthius are true babblers anyway.

CHECKLISTS AND FIELD GUIDES

FIELD GUIDE TO THE SONGBIRDS OF SOUTH AMERICA (UTexas Press, 2009) (from ROBERT Ridgely)

We follow the IOC List. A couple of quibbles, but we are following it in by far the majority of cases.

Thank you very much for your great website with the IOC World Bird List! Birding Africa now uses the International Ornithological Congress (IOC) bird names to keep their guides and tour participants up to date with modern nomenclature and systematics.

African Bird Club (Forwarded by D. B. Donsker)

The African Bird Club informing has completely revised their African Bird List. As part of the update, they have referenced the IOC List and names. Here’s a blurb from their Introduction to the revised list:Changes include:

Updates to Clements’s checklist dated July and December 2005. (It is noted that a 7th edition of this checklist is due for publication in January 2007 and will be incorporated as appropriate in due course.)

Handbook of Birds of the World volumes 10 and 11 (to end of warblers and flycatchers).

The IOC list of English Bird Names has been incorporated. Also the single asterisk following a secondary English name now indicates that this is the IOC preferred name (previously the asterisk indicated the name used by the Sinclair & Ryan fieldguide).

“We have chosen to follow ‘Howard and Moore’ (Dickinson 2003) and the new IOC-endorsed list of recommended English names (Gill and Wright 2006) with regard to the hyphenation of English names. Both works explain the rationale for their use of hyphens, but generally they take a minimalist approach, avoiding hyphens unless it is considered essential to use them.”

AOU Checklist of North American Birds

The NACC invited the IOC North America subcommittee to submit proposals for change. The first proposal submitted April 2007 invited the NACC to align their guidelines for spelling and use of compound names (see 6th edition of the AOU Checklist of North American birds) with those recommended by the IOC. They rejected this proposal (see Auk 124:1472), but will review proposals on a species by species basis. This decision separates the AOU from other leading ornithological institutions and publishers (BOU, WOS, DOS, HBW, DK, ToL project etc.).

Birds of Africa: South of the Sahara (From Sinclair and Ryan’s introduction, see also Kaestner review in Birding, 39 [3], page 86)

“The decision on a single set of common names was taken out of our hands to some extent by the International Congress….. which after much heated debate came up with the list we use here. We do not personally like all the choices made, but in the interests of attaining a unifed list we have adopted them. However, we retain major synonyms in parentheses.”

BirdLife International

BLI released v1) of their world species list for comments. It is presented as a well-annotated Excel spreadsheet available for download at <http://www.birdlife.org/datazone/species/downloads/BirdLife_Checklist_Version_0.xls>, supplemented by additional information on the web at <http://www.birdlife.org/datazone/species/taxonomy.html>. Recommended IOC names, when different, are included in a column of alternative names. In their own words:”For each species the common name officially adopted by BirdLife is taken from the main source used to determine the scientific name. Additional common names from the other sources are also stored, as are accented names. It should be noted that this work was undertaken parallel to that carried out by the IOC and recently published by Gill and Wright (2006). We have had not yet had time to consider their findings and proposals but we have also stored the common names from Gill and Wright (2006) where scientific names match electronically (c.90% taxa). In order to maintain global consistency, additional rules have been applied to the name officially adopted by BirdLife (but not to common names of taxa that are Under Review).”

Clements Checklist of the Birds of the World , Sixth Edition 2007

David O. Matson and Dave Sargeant have compiled a master Excel file (downloadable from the home page) that compares the IOC species list (1.7) with that in Clements (6e), and generously allowed us to make this work available through this website. Please note that this copyrighted file is not available for commercial use.

Danish Ornithological Society/BirdLife Denmark

The Danish Ornithological Society’s list of Danish names for all birds of the world follows the IOC World List. The Danish names are published in the new book “Danske navne pa alverdens Fugle (2008)” and on the website of the socieety.

German bird list (from Peter Barthel)

The list of German birds with the new English IOC names for the participants of the IOC is finished now. Compared to the original version, only 47 names had to be changed, and most of them are much better now.There are changes I liked very much, like e.g. Short-toed Snake Eagle, Rosy Starling and Long-tailed Bushtit. On the other hand, Pomarine Skua is not logical, and Great Black-headed Gull is much longer than Pallas’s Gull, invites confusion with Great Black-backed Gull and makes a modifier necessary for the Common Black-headed Gull, which will never be used because the name of this really common bird is far too long now. [NOTE; THESE NAMES HAVE BEEN CHANGED!]And I’m afraid that most Europeans are not really happy with the Kurrichane Buttonquail. But that’s what happens in democratic committees with members from several continents ..

Thank you for keeping me in the loop. I have forwarded your e-mail to all members of the Howard & Moore who affect decisions on vernacular names and have reminded them that I have told you that we will work towards a commonality. Realistically I do not expect this will be achieved in one step or even two, but with goodwill we can eventually get there.